baby not taking bottle

hi there!!!

i am soooo stressed out. when my lo was born, everyone said that i should give him a bottle so that i could have a break....i was so scared of nipple confusion that i never did. At 3 months we introduced the bottle and he took to it almost immediately. Now that i am back at work he's refusing the bottle! Thank goodness my work is fairly flexible. i have resorted to feeding him between my appointments as i am so tired of coming back after being gone for 5 hours and hearing that he hasn't drunk any of my ebm.

is it ok for him to be that long without food? apparently he's crabby, almost like he is hungry? should i try a different teat? i bought the medela calma teat as it was marketed as being the closest to breastfeeding?

Re: baby not taking bottle

It is okay for a baby to go a long period during the day without eating provided he makes up for it at night. It's awesome that you have the flexibility to nurse during the workday. Will you be able to continue doing that?

Re: baby not taking bottle

That's just the thing....i won't always be able to come home to feed. In fact there is a conference coming up that I'll be required to be at whole day and it concerns me that my lo might decide to go the entire day without some nourishment :-(

is it true that they will drink when they are hungry and won't starve themselves?

Thanks for the advice

Will try different bottles etc. Didn't even know cold milk was an option!

Re: baby not taking bottle

Hi, I feel your pain, I was in the exact same boat. LO initially took a bottle but when I started back at work, refused all bottles. My MIL bought every nipple at the store and what worked best was the NUK latex orthopedic nipple (labeled most compatible for breastfeeding). Sometimes LOs don't like the feel of silicone.

LO went through a week of 6-hr long feeding strikes but eventually took the bottle. Other moms say they syringe or cup feed as last resort measure. Just keep trying, kellymom also has articles (which the mamas here had forwarded to me) on best ways to introduce bottle. Those were helpful too.

Hope baby takes the bottle soon... best of luck to you as you re-settle back at work... it's painful at first but you get a rhythym going and it gets better!

Re: baby not taking bottle

Thanks!!! Will need all the luck i can get!

Tasted the milk from Fri bottle and it had an after taste...so i thought that was the reason he wouldn't take it. But today i expressed some fresh milk. he barely took an ounce out of the 1 bottle....and at the next feeding he pushed the bottle away!

I thought giving bottles were easy....looks like I have to stock up on a few more brands *sigh*

Re: baby not taking bottle

how old is your lo? i know that with all 3 of mine, and i'm sure with this one coming, i started using sippy cups instead of bottles. but that was around 5 or so months. it worked great for them, because they knew that, if mommy wasn't there, they could drink out of something that wasn't trying to "trick" them. lol. they have the soft sippies that are easy to use for toothless or mostly toothless babies. (of course, i'm no dr, so if there is something completely wrong with it, i don't know it.... but my opinion is that they're no worse than bottles. ya know? you could even start with water if you don't want to spill all the milk in the process of learning how to use it (water isn't necessary to bf babies, though.)

Re: baby not taking bottle

He's 4 months old....hmmmm....Maybe I should try sippy cups. I haven't seen ones that are for babies without teeth, but then again I was never looking. Always thought my time for sippy cups were way off and only coming later.